A fat or oil has been conventionally blended in a frozen dessert for the purpose of, for example, imparting a taste and flavor, improving a palate feeling, or improving physical properties.
As the fat or oil for a frozen dessert, the following (1) to (4) has been heavily used: (1) a liquid oil typified by soybean oil or rapeseed oil having an extremely low melting point in consideration of a satisfactory melt-in-the-mouth feeling in a freezing temperature range; (2) an SUS-type triglyceride characterized by having a sharp melt-in-the-mouth feeling at temperatures near the body temperature (a triglyceride having an unsaturated fatty acid at the 2-position and saturated fatty acids at the 1- and 3-positions; (3) a lauric acid-rich fat or oil such as coconut oil or palm kernel oil; and (4) a solid fat typified by palm oil.
However, the liquid oil (1) is insufficient in amount of crystals even at low temperature and hence is poor in emulsion stability. In the case of the solid fats (2) to (4), all of the fats or oils containing the solid fats pass through the throat to be ingested without melting in the mouth. Hence, the solid fats are poor in melt-in-the-mouth feeling in some cases. In addition, the solid fats are liable to provide frozen desserts with poor fineness and texture.
On the other hand, a fat or oil containing diacylglycerols at high concentrations has been known to have physiological effects such as suppression of an increase in triglyceride (neutral fat) in blood after meal and less accumulation in the body (Patent Documents 1 and 2), and is expected to be used as an alternative to conventional fats or oils.
Hitherto, for example, a diacylglycerol-containing semisolid fat or oil or the like synthesized from palm oil or the like has been reported as the diacylglycerol-containing fat or oil (Patent Document 3).